Getting Tyred with this

After managing to post a blistering 3 full blog entries in 2016 reader you'd be forgiven for thinking that I would retreat from the limelight cast by a (near) double figure all time hit count on at least one of those entries and dial back my post rate for the coming year if only to give the server banks a breather.
I feel compelled however to type up this first post of the year as at least one person asked what sort of things I use the shed for, although as a disclaimer I could quite easily have imagined that conversation. So the following is just one example:-
We have alloy wheels on our car, a couple of which been misbehaving of late, namely going flat within a few days. Checking the one more closely revealed a nail embedded in the tread. I decided to give repairing it a go, rolled it into the shed and duly plugged the offending hole with a repair kit. I noticed however that the spare I put on while I did so also went down in an alarmingly short time and after investigating further, i.e. dunking them in a wheelbarrow full of water, found that they were also leaking from around the rims. In all I had three tyres which struggled to contain a useful amount of wind for more than three or four days.

Taking the car to the local tyre monkies to get them reseated may sound all well and good but I suspected that there may be more going on than a quick rub with a rag and a brushfull of bead sealer could put right, especially as two of the tyres had been put on within the last six months or so. The answer then seemed to sound a bit like make (or buy...nah..) a D.I.Y tyre changing contraption so I could take a better shuftys at the alloys au naturel..Oh I say steady on there petrolheads

It turned out that the wheels were in a pretty poor state. The paint around the inside of the rims where the tyre bead seals had bubbled and there was a fair amount of corrosion. The one pictured was actually the best of the three. I stripped all the paint off  the sealing faces, lightly sanded the alloy back to shiny and then resprayed them with some alloy wheel paint to protect them again. Not a full recondition job, just the bits that matter when you want the things to stay airtight. When refitting I've used a smear of rubber red grease rather than tyre soap/bead sealer..no real reason other than I had some to hand and I know it will offer a bit of extra protection against any further corrosion.
It seems that most manual tyre changers suffer from various things, a lack of capacity so low profile tyres are very awkward to work with, stability, as in they need concreting in or at the very least bolting to the floor or a large pallet which means they take up ridiculous amounts of room,not to mention that you can easily damage the alloy when using one as they are basically a clamp for the wheel and a honking great pry bar. My particular alloy wheels happen to have 225 45 17's on them which tick pretty much all of the drawback boxes when it comes to changing them.
After watching several youtubesfull of the subject, mainly balding rotund redneck types struggling to demonstrate various Chinese looking harbour freight type toolage I decided to adopt the suck it and see approach.

 I turned a few bits of scrap flat metal bar, some old handy angle shelving parts, gas pipe, an electric motor foot plate, a Kawasaki 250Z front wheel spacer and headstock washer, some bolts from a bunk bed, a nylon washing machine transit fastener, a rubber mat, a plastic box divider a length of 5/8" whit all thread, more than a few 2.5mm welding rods oh and a can of red spray paint into...well a tyre changer.

	Shed Stuff The Tyre Changer Click thumbnails to enlarge...

Attempting to keep the thing still  without floor anchors or gallons of readymix concrete was the first hurdle, I tried making the beadbreaker part first and realised quickly that there was some pretty hefty forces at work. As the wheel and tyre sit on the base itself I was hoping that just pushing the lever down would sort of clamp the whole thing down..nope. Holding a 5ft bar in the top to steady it was barely enough to wrestle the first side of tyre one off its bead. I was intending this to be 2 separate things, the beadbreaker and then the 'table' part, the idea being I would just clamp the latter in a vice. Nope again. Way too high once the wheel is sitting on there for that to be practical. This was very much trial and error so it's actually become 2 parts that slide together and by happy accident once the table is attached to the bench with braces and sat on top of the bead breaker bit it all suddenly becomes reasonably rigid. I'm thinking now the base could be better still if it was more of a cross shape, it would be easy to bolt on a couple of folding angle  iron extension feet so when stored it will still fit snugly in a corner

The pole that you sort of spin around at the top when using it doubles as the clamp, the alloys are protected by a thin piece of ply underneath and plastic washer and rubber mat on the top. The pry bar has a nylon roller which runs against the wheel rim while in use and a spigot welded on the opposite side to guide the tyre bead over the rim
 I found out that when refitting low profiles it's impossible to keep them pushed down out of the bead seating by hand so I came up with the arm that allows the business end of the bead breaker part to be used as you refit too. I just added an adjustable collar to it and you push down the tyre wall by sliding the bar and collar to upright under the channel part of the arm. You do have to release it to get the pry bar past it at the half way point and then replace it again once you get past it which can be a bit of a faff about, nevertheless it makes a massive difference to how easy it is to refit the tyre.
 Photos should show enough if you feel  like  creating something similar plus you can refer to the parts list mentioned a few paragraphs up. If you are really desperate to know anything else there is always the comments box below.

Growing our own.

Well reader this is starting to become a bit of a habit. A third post this year and it's not even October yet. As I vaguely hinted at in the shed blog (What do you mean you haven't read it? You must find time to immerse yourself in its visual symphony and marvel at my DIY and photoblog coding skills) This is a mini follow up to include the greenhouse build and garden vegetable patch makeover.

Much of this resulted from having a sizable pile of bricks left over from knocking the front part of the old shed down and spotting a second hand 'proper' greenhouse in the local online ad listings. A spot of expert haggling reduced the price of the greenhouse from £70 to £50. It came with some deck boards as a makeshift base(they were roughly cut and it was just placed on them in the garden where we dismantled and fetched it from) I think there were 13 boards and 3 or 4 lengths of studding, as luck would have it I saved the picture from the original ad listing...old bloggers habit see. It also included some rather nifty shelving units and a selection of plant pots. In the past I've had several plastic/poly bag 'greenhouses'  none of which has lasted more than a season or two.

The vegetable patch is what used to be our lawn, our garden slopes down away from the house and over the years we have altered it so it consists of three flat(ish) levels, patio at the top, lawn/veg patch in the middle and my shed area at the bottom. Connecting them is a ramp down the side, originally for bikes and the like and a couple of steps down on to the lawn. Much groundwork, walls, gates and fence building has gone on at various junctures over the last 26 years or so mostly aimed at keeping kids and/or wammals contained in suitable areas.
Now here's a top tip, when purchasing garden buildings pay particular attention to their size, otherwise you could be tempted to think a 6'x6' greenhouse doesn't take up that much more room than a 6'x4'...After laying out the 6'x6' square greenhouse base on the lawn I concluded that a raised deck protruding say umm 2ftish  beyond the boundary wall of said lawn would craftily obfuscate any slight *cough* errors in judgement. When space is at a premium 12sq ft can grow a lot of beans.

Getting Started Click thumbnails to enlarge...

Once I'd tidied up the garden enough to start I knocked up the frame and steps for the deck using reclaimed and left over joists from the shed build, the decking itself is entirely what came with the greenhouse. I left a quarter of the interior un-boarded for directly planting in to and used the square footage I saved from that to do the front and the steps.

Bricks & Mortar Click thumbnails to enlarge...

 With the pile of bricks cleaned off a bit I put 3 courses on top of the lawn retaining walls and added a little dwarf wall down the side of the greenhouse. We leveled the old veg patch/lawn off properly and added fresh compost from the two full compost bins I'd had brewing for about the last 3 years. I rebuilt the picket fence and added a hole digging dog thwarter gate for easy access from the greenhouse side.

If you have stumbled into this page interested in the horticulturing aspect of greenhouses I can't really provide much other than these pics of what we have grown over the last few months.

Fruits Of Labour Click thumbnails to enlarge...

 We have beans...lots of them, we did start weighing them as we were using them, but lost count after a few weeks and upwards of 25lb's worth. The cucumbers have done very well, I guess about 2 dozen so far off 7 plants grown from a poundshop grow your own seed kit containing a little propogator and a cupful of compost. The wife has just pickled the first few beetroot and there are radishes, sprouts, a few sacrificial lettuce (we hoped they might safisfy a few creepy crawlies and birds..) plus a paltry 2 carrots (..they didn't). 3 out of about 15 peppers did start to come but got bullied by the cucumbers and tomatoes while I wasn't looking and we failed on peas, spring onions and flowers completely. I did however use the first ripened tomato in a cheese and tom sandwich yesterday.

Vauxhall Zafira B 2.2 16v Direct. Timing chain and water pump problems

I've just replaced the timing chains and water pump on my 2005 Vauxhall Zafira B 2.2  16v direct. I was very dubious about attempting this on account of not being fully sure of my own diagnosis and the sharp intakes of breath from local mechanics and refusals to even attempt it.  Main dealer obviously out of the question as the last time I ventured in to one they decided to charge 35 quid labour to change a bulb, once bitten and all that..Online research seemed to indicate 4 figure bills for similar jobs. I am aware that failing timing chains and tensioners were a known issue and there were recalls however this engine has done 85k and is 11 years old.
 
Its not really worth me writing this haynesesque style but I thought I'd share a few things I found out as I couldn't find much specifically related to doing this on a Zafira. Firstly its a Z22YH ecotec engine the same as in the 2002 onwards Vauxhall Vectra,Signum and I believe Astra. Secondly it's as near as fk is to swearing the same basic engine that GM have been putting in all manner of jalopy worldwide since about 2000. As such instructional youtube  vids for most 2.0l and 2.2l  Vauxhall, Opel,  Pontiac,  Saab and even the odd Fiat and Alfa romeo will all be relevant and give general guidance if you aren't sure where the last bolt is that's still holding the damn water pump on. It also means that aftermarket parts are readily available and can be a lot cheaper if you do your homework, cross reference and search by part numbers.
  
Symptoms were rattle which has gradually been getting worse over the last few months, coming from the timing chain side, I was also getting occasional misfire under load at higher revs  and consequently the engine emmisions fault light coming on every time it did.(Note a) Initially I replaced the usual service part suspects so spark plugs, air filter had been ruled out over the previous few weeks and oil and filter change was within the last 3 thousand miles. Eventually it got a little quieter and began overheating. At this point it was blowing water from the expansion/filler tank limiting journeys to 10 minutes or less. I suspected at this point that the rattle had been the water pump failing, possibly the impellor blades as there was no visible water leak from the casting itself. I could tell that no water was being pumped around the engine at all by feeling the radiator which remained cold versus the rest of the hoses which quickly got up to pressure cap releasing hot

As the water pump is driven off the timing chain, or more accurately the balance timing chain and the engine is notorious for chain tensioner issues I knew replacing just one part was probably not going to be an ideal solution. I could have forked out fifty odd quid for the timing locking tools and just tried replacing the pump (glad I didn't) but instead opted to buy the kits needed for both timing chains, a new water pump plus oil, filter etc so I could change everything. The parts cost about £250 from various motor factors on ebay. Both timing kits were aftermarket incidentally, FAI branded TCK3 and TCK5, they contain everything you need, chains sprockets seal gasket tensioners guides and bolts where nececessary
 The better how to videos I found show the engine out (Note b) but I completed this without any real difficulty with the car parked on the road in front of my house.

All covers off

View from under wheelarch with splashguards removed

 On a Zafira the job requires removing the front wheel and the front half of the splash guards under the offside wheelarch and the covers between the bonnet and the windscreen/bulkhead. This looks like a bigger job than it is (4 bolts and few clips for cable routing and windscreen washer tubes) This gives much improved and necessary access to the back of the engine. You need to fetch the air filter housing and airflow meter off and the left hand engine mount  so you can get to the timing chain cover. You need to take the exhaust manifold off to get to the water pump and thermostat housing. If you undo the thermostat housing block complete it will move back far enough to swing the water pump cover and rigid pipe out of the way, without having to disconnect any hoses or even unplug the temperature sensor.


Once I'd got the timing chain cover off I was not expecting to see what I did. The balance shafts and water pump drivetrain was worn to the point where there were no teeth at all on the exhaust balance shaft sprocket or the crankshaft sprocket so the chain would have just been hanging loose and largely stationary around what was left of a spinning crankshaft sprocket.

No teeth left..

Tension was non existent as the chain had gained enough slack to fully extend the tensioner and then some, the guides had deep worn in grooves and an inch or so was broken off the end of one entirely.  The water pump sprocket and inlet balance shaft sprocket were badly worn. Bear in mind I had been running this engine (albeit very gingerly and under 3000rpm for short periods) for probably 50 or more miles in its final overheating and therefore non spinning waterpump or balance shaft state.

All the old parts

The camshaft chain and sprockets were still intact although very obviously worn (put up against the new chain it had stretched a good link and a half).

 The only thing you can't do with the engine in the car is pull the balance shafts out completely, they only come out as far as the steel box section in the engine bay even with the engine dropped as far as it will go onto the front subframe.

View from the top with air filter box and engine mount removed

This was enough for me to be able to get a fairly hefty pipe wrench on what was left of the gears to hold them while I undid the bolts. Tightening the new ones to the correct torque requires a bit of care so as not to damage anything, I stopped the whole drivetrain moving using a spanner as a sort of t-bar between 2 of the 3 bolts holding the water pump sprocket on, but there are probably several other equally or more effective ways to do it.
    
There is absolutely no need for any timing tools if you replace everything.  Before you take the old camchain off turn the crankshaft so the keyway in it is pointing up(tdc), the exhaust cam timing mark is pointing at about 10 or 11 oclock and the inlet cam mark is about 1 or 2 oclock. The keyways in the camshafts, balance shafts and the marks on the new chains and sprockets are then self explanatory, I'm not saying it would be impossible to go wrong but if you're confident enough to be thinking about attempting this I'd say its highly unlikely. In any case you will spin the thing over a couple of times by hand to make sure there are no nasty surprises once the new chains are on.

Note a
 If you are wondering  (which you might very well be if you are reading this) the fuel pump and fuel pressure regulator problems that are fairly well documented don't show these symptoms, the engine will literally just cut out randomly with the spanner light on rather than misfire. When that started happening to me a couple of years ago it was the fuel pressure regulator sticking.
 
Note b
A well worded Youtube search will give loads of results but I found this one particularly helpful for the chains and this one for the water pump.